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So, Mulcair and Rae, up in a tree, k-i-s-s-i-n-g...
I'd like to know why these two are so bent on destroying Libby Davies over pretty much nothing. Is this part of the new party coalition building we keep hearing so much about but that everyone keeps denying?
Are we looking at the new leadership of the Liberal Democrats or something?
P.S. I wrote to Jack Layton, my MP, last night about this. Haven't had a response yet.
This is all over the media. The common message being repeated that Libby believes that Israel is illegitimate and shouldn't exist.
The NDP should find a way to counter this message or Libby will end up being marginalized like Ignatieff was after the Conservative's ad campaign last year.
Maybe Libby should make a statement?
I think Bob Rae wants to "destroy" Libby because his all-consuming passion in life is undermining the NDP and this is just his latest gratuitous attempt to do that.
As i wrote earlier, I think Mulcair just wants to get it "on the record" that he took a hardline taking her to task for saying the "wrong thing re: 1948" and its all about how it looks in his riding. He doesn't want to "destroy" anyone - except maybe Martin Cauchon.
He doesn't want to destroy anyone. Just backstab a very honourable colleague. I hope others will join me in an unwavering, impassioned defence of this extraordinary person.
Her commitment and integrity contrasts with the scrabbling, miserable, petty and dishonest feeding frenzy the machine men seem eager to unleash.
Who stands for democracy? Who stands as a voice to the voiceless?
Libby Davies.
Layton was on CBC Power and Politics. He's firmly clarifying the party's policy, but I get no sense that he's prepared to give in to the right-wing hysteria on this. I agree with Stockholm about what's probably going on here behind the scenes. Note that one Conservative blogger on Twitter is now calling for someone to register the domain name "hezbolibby.com", and someone else is linking her partner to a "pro-Palestinian" website.
I think people are going to protect Libby, but if we let the rightwinters ramp it up any further, we're just waving a red flag at the bull-ies, and encouraging them to keep following people around with videocams.
Bob Rae is an ally of Martin Cauchon's within the Liberal party, by the way, so that's exactly what he's up to. You don't see him doing the same with folks in his own party.
Layton will never criticize Mulcair - he is obsessed with keeping Mulcair's seat at all costs. It means more to him than anything else.
But as you said on the previous thread, hopefully Mulcair will lose his seat in the next election. Mulcair is a very unpleasant man.
It's good that we can agree on something.
If that is Mulcair's intent, he is going about it in a very bizzare way- pissing off lots of NDP members and supporters/voters who look to Libby Davies as a person of integrity and virtue. If Mulcair's is the future of the NDP, than he can have it.
Right now though I think Layton is hanging in there for Davies and I expect to continue to see him do so.
If nothing else this should teach us that the left needs to be much more careful of its language than anyone else. It is totally unfair, but seeing the lies, distortions and pile on happening it is pretty clear that even the most innocent of mistakes can lead to some pretty nasty behaviour by the media and others if it is said by someone on the left. The right it seems can say all kinds of fantastical and repugnent things and that is fine and dandy. This is a lesson we need to learn when criticizing those on the left that are trying to protect themselves from these kinds of attacks.
Exactly there is nothing unusual, which is why parsing every single word uttered by an NDP MP is so useless, but it goes on here ALL the time.
This incident shows they must pick their words carefully as the standard they are held to is much different than any other party in Canada, especially the Conservatives by the MSM. You can make this about hating the NDP, but this issue makes it clear that the NDP is held to a much higher standard then anyone else from both sides. It makes the job almost impossible when supposed allies attack as well.
Yes, she must be supported.
You do see how getting a simple date wrong has turned something into a story that has allowed the government and Liberals to squirm out of accountability for that deal on the detainee documents, though.
That's exactly the intent behind doing that kind of gotcha video blogging, and I think we're going to see more of it. And I sure don't think Libby should be sacrificed to that kind of agenda. I think our strength is to have both of them as Deputy Leaders. We take the bait every time someone tries a divide-and-conquer, which is why they have so much fun doing it.
This came to me through Facebook. Thought others might find at least some of the information useful:
Life, that is pretty much what I wrote to Muclair and Jack this am.....you wanna see women walk away from the NDP? It would be over this.
'Muc'lair has shown himself to be just another ass nubby.
And you know as I stated before about something else, if this was a man, who had said this, or similar, no a damn thing would have been done by Muclair. Nor perhaps by Rae and Harper... that it is a woman and a feminist they could not wait to "get her", IMV.
Drive women out of politics seems to be the order of the day.
Actually, each of these "incidents" needs to be judged on its own merits and they can't all be lumped together. I think that Libby's relatively benign and perfecctly defensible comments cannot in any way be compared with Helen Thomas saying that all Israelis should "go back where they came from" (ie: Poland and Germany) or Wendy Hughes suggesting wild conspiracy theories that the Mossad cooked up 9/11 etc...this is comparing apples and oranges. Quite frankly, I think its insult to Libby Davies to juxtapose her with those two idiots.
No, the NDP is not. What is held to a whole other standard is Israel. All debate is always about poor Israel. Israel just murdered 9 people. The IRC has just announced Israel is in violation of international law for the purposeful and cruel brutalization of a parcel of land made up of mostly children. But there shall be no criticism of this. And any criticism of this shall be beaten down and the critic isolated and ruined.
The Liberals can't rise above the polls because Canadians recognize the party as morally bankrupt and weak. This is an opportunity for the NDP to stand apart and actually be the conscience of Canada and actually express the morality so many Canadians are waiting to grasp on to. Will they? I doubt it. This fiasco more than anything demonstrates how badly we need a new party of the left.
True I could have added that the stakes for a woman on the left are even higher.
ETA
Sorry that was @remind just to make it clear.
That's right the continued occupation is all the fault of the NDP. Get a grip. But thanks again for proving my point about the standards the NDP are held too.
Yes, it is odd to see a deputy leader go out of his way to attack the other deputy leader. This is why I'd like to know just what he's got up his sleeve. And whatever it is, Jack Layton better not be going along with it.
I honestly don't think there will be any marginalization of Davies.
After the Gaza flotilla massacre, the lights went off on the "you're de-legitimizing Israel" attack. It still plays in Ottawa, on media covering backroom politics, and in the Canwest papers. But the average Canadian just doesn't accept that anymore.
And Davies, unlike Ignatieff, is a real politician who can communicate real issues and concerns with people. Ignatieff was marginalized because he is a marginal political talent.
Further evidence: Warren Kinsella, who previously would have denounced Davies as the devil incarnate because of this, has been silent so far.
accent on "supposed".
In the last thread I was at first called out for fingering Muclair, then sided with pretty quickly when it became apparent, that thius was a way to bash the NDP. made themselves completely identifiable, if they were not already.
Was almost sorry I fingered Muclair as it gave an opening. But Muclair deserves to be fingered for his part in this.
Thanks for the posting of the letter writer.
The blogger that interviewed Libby in this viral video can be found at:
Comments from Left Field
Yep in my books it is Mulcair who stepped over the line, not Davies. He is the one that needs to be apologizing. I sure wouldn't want to be in the next caucus meeting. Although my personal experience with Libby Davies suggest to me she will take the high road when she has every right to be hoofing it on the low road.
That may be so - but that doesn't mean that we have to play along by lumping these incidents together when they are are very different and each needs to be disc8ussed on its own merits. If Libby Davies had actually said what Helen Thomas said (which she never would) and explicitly said that Israel had no right to exist and that all Israelis 6 million ought to be expelled to wherever their great-grandparents came from - then I suspect she would be sitting as an Independent MP today and no one would be shedding any tears over it.
Judy Rebick stands firmly behind Libby.
Sorry for the drift, but shouldn't you have to write what the person actually said if you're going to put it in quotes?
Q: Any comments on Israel? We're asking everyone today, any comments on..
Thomas: Tell them to get the hell out of Palestine.
Q: Oooh. Any better comments?
Thomas: Remember, these people are occupied, and it's their land. It's not German and it's not Polish.
Q: So where should they go, what should they do?
Thomas: They can go home.
Q: Where is home?
Thomas: Poland. Germany.
Q: So you are saying Jews should go back to Poland?
Thomas: And America and everywhere else. Why push people out who have lived their for centuries? See?
Thank you for correcting the record, Ripple.
I really appreciate Unionist's list. I see progressive women. And one progressive openly gay man. Easy pickings it seems - in an age when Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Pat Robertson, Anne Coulter, Sarah Palin and so many others ooze the most astonishing lies and hate with nary a whimper.
Reading the comments some people are leaving on the internet about this story has been disheartening.
I've seen too many homophobic comments regarding this story today. And too many anti-Muslim comments.
There have even been some classist comments about Libby's riding being drug infested! People are even making fun of people in Libby's riding.
Reading those verbatims actually makes Thomas's comments look even worse and more damaging that i originally thought.